Steam Town Railfest This Weekend

I am sorry to tell you that there will be no steam at Railfest except for Seth Corwin's live steamers and what ever we have running on the Anthracite Hi-Railer's layout.

Stop by and see us next to the cut-a-way locomotive in the technology building.  

Conductor Earl  

Since I have not been to Steamtown since about 1999, and I have to be in Wilkes Barre later in the afternoon anyway, I will probably go on Saturday.

Michael,

      Four of us from the BDSME in Bethlehem will also be going Saturday AM. After all any train is better than no trains. Hopefully NS will have some thing interesting as well as CP.

JohnB

From what I see so far, Amtrak is not comming. North Shore and CP neither. NS sent a small switcher.Some of you may know that the all railroads in the NE are  short of power so there is none to spare. If there are any suprises late in the day (Friday) I will let you know.

My invitations stands, stop by the Anthracite Hi-Railers layout and make yourselves known. It will be good to meet you. I plan on being there all day Saturday as I have no railroad responsibities this year. I had to take a year off  for family matters.

See you there.

Conductor Earl

Change the name to "Traintown", run the DL&W F's (and RDG F's if they are still operable), and the NKP diesel (still wondering why it's not painted as it was, DL&W), and you'd have a "fun" event.  Not as much fun as an event with steam, of course.  Odd, no visiting steam, despite the availability of such.

Heck - even if they were to "simply" reposition all the displays for better viewing and photography, it'd be worth while for many.

/Mitch

Available, yes. But, who is going to finance getting "visiting steam" to Steam Town?

I might get a chance to stop by. Last time I was there, I took my youngest son Mark and his friend Paul. We climbed aboard a passenger car to find out it was  privately owned, but ended up staying and talking to the owner for quite a while. 

Don

What's in Wilkes-Barre, a pothole fest? Just rode through there a few times yesterday and today, and Hazle Ave is a mess; hopefully it will be paved soon.

Don, formerly of Wilkes-Barre, a good place to be from!

Here's the RailFest 2014 web site.

Huh? No STEAM at Steamtown? Why do they call it steamtown?

Will steam engines be up and running next year?

Probably not.

Four of us from the Black Diamond Society of Model Engineers (Monongahela Ray, KevinB, BigBoy Frank and myself) visited Steam Town on Saturday. Generally had a good enjoyable day despite the fact there was no live steam at Steam Town. On the positive side are the following:

          1) The 0-6-0 Switcher #26 looked more completed than I have seen it in years. Maybe it will be running in 2015. Nobody was making any promises.

          2) got to meet Conductor Earl at his display of O gauge trains. Very nice display and he is a good guy to talk to.

          3) Speeders in the back of the repair shops giving rides to people. Looked like the kids were getting a real kick out of this.

The only real disappointment besides no steam was the no progress on the B&M 3713 Pacific. It looked about the same as a year ago. Some parts of it were in the repair shop, some on flat cars in the yard. If I had to guess when it would be finished I would say 10 years at minimum.

 Also 4012 Big Boy looked like crap (no other way to say it), the paint was peeling off of the tender. I think they only painted it a few years ago. Must of used latex paint.

JohnB

The September Trains magazine had an interview with the new superintendent of Steamtown, and it didn't sound hopeful for a quick return to steam, as I recall.  It was just on the list of things to look at.

Steamtown, with three working steam locos, was very enjoyable to visit during the first several years in Scranton, especially the Labor Day celebration.